Vet school is a sea of snark.

Going back over my histology notes is rather fun. This is why:

And from a neuro review, courtesy of a friend:

I wish I could take credit for this brilliance.

I did not write this. Sadly. I do not yet have Dr. Graves for an instructor, but you have NO IDEA how excited I am for that time to come. This is an excerpt from the Tenesmus Times (Vol. 3, Issue 2), the vet med newsletter.

WHAT THE HELL IS HE TALKING ABOUT??

Match the Dr. Graves quote with the correct subject.

1. It's about as uncommon as a Baptist church without a schoolbus.

2. This looks like a cat sitting on the stomach of a pregnant alien.

3. Strike three and it's time to remove the penis.

4. You will treat it overnight, and it will look like six pounds of shit in a five pound bag.

5. Just palpate Barbie's butt; wiggle your finger across the back of her crack.

If you are at all interested in actually trying to match them, here are your choices:

A. Cat with hypoadrenocorticism

B. Urethral obstruction

C. Palpating the prostate

D. Hyperthyroidism in cats

E. Neutrophil in glomerulus

Happy matching!

RAWR PASSIVE-AGGRESSIVE BLOGGING.

Dear dudes,

As an educated and moderately intelligent person, I am not impressed by lack of punctuation and capitalization in emails, texts, or any other form of written communication. I also do not deal well with "chatspeak," so you can stop that shit right now.

Also, if you say that you're going to ask me out for another date, a month is not an acceptable lag time. If you weren't interested in having a second date, you should have A) not mentioned a second date, or B) not been chickenshit and said that you weren't interested. And while I realize that I, as an independent woman, could have called you, YOU made the offer, therefore YOU do the calling and planning.

If you follow the suggestions above, I may elevate you from "dude" to "man" status.

Hoping your day is full of sunshine and rainbows,

Katy

Slightly ridiculous. Entirely amusing.

I, along with many of my other classmates, have noticed a few odd things that professors say during lectures. For example, our gross anatomy professor has dropped gems like "Whack it with a broom," and "to slow down a rat, break it's clavicle."

And then there was this during histology:

The professors do not have a monopoly on silliness, however. Here are a few of the things that have been posted on our class Facebook wall:

(The dude on the left is our histo prof.)

And my personal favorite with the comments that followed:

And that is why I love my vet school class.

I think my brain is full.

Hey folks! I promise that I have not been sucked into a black hole or replaced by a plastic replica of myself.

At least not since the last time I checked. Someone get me a sonic screwdriver (I just nerded all OVER).

Lately my brain has been taken over by muscle attachments and what hormones use cAMP vs. DAG/IP3 as second messengers, so I haven't really come up with anything interesting or clever to write.

Here's a list of things I could potentially write about but lack the brainpower to develop into a cohesive post:

1. Swing dancing: I still can't follow.
2. Cooking: I think I love chickpeas.
3. Housekeeping: There are carpet tumbleweeds EVERYWHERE.
4. Falling off my bike: My advice is to make sure you secure your plastic bag seat cover prior to riding lest it fly in your face.
5. Vlogbrothers: I have subscribed to two channels that have no videos uploaded... yet.
6. Lab practical: Screw you, horse leg.
7. Midterms: Halfway there.

 And to continue the theme of non-organization, here are the picture that were just transferred to my computer from my phone.

Hormones.

Illustration from my large animal anatomy book. Because there are eyes on horse penises.

WHAT IS THIS THING?!

I think I was trying to find a template for my piranha plant headpiece. Or I was trying to determine the correct serving plate for a human head.

Yup. Hang out with these guys voluntarily.

Marketing people: clever naming of products works!

So fluffy. And totally gassing up my couch.

Ghiradelli endorses marshmallow usage with their hot chocolate, even if it is akin to putting ketchup on filet mignon.

Is this what it feels like to have a child?

Today was my first day of classes, but that's beside the point. Sort of.

One of the perks (ha!) of being a vet student is that they give you free stuff, such as Advantage and Advantix II (that's pet pest control in case you didn't know). I decided that free was probably good, and picked some up for my dog.

I was a few days late this month with  Tess' flea and tick prevention as per usual. Had I been paying attention, I would have applied it on Saturday. Not really a big deal. I read the directions on the new stuff this morning and dumped it between her shoulder blades, then went off to my first day of lecture.

I came home at lunch to find Tess horking (all terrier owners know what I mean) and scratching herself madly. I wasn't really that concerned until she vomited or regurgitated up some white foamy liquid. I thought, "Huh, that's funny," in a less calm manner than that reads. Since the only change in her normal routine was the flea and tick junk, I went online to see if anyone elses dog had had any adverse reaction to Advantix.

THAT was a mistake.

There are many websites that blame Advantix for ataxia and other neurological symptoms in their dogs, even death. There are some that claim that Bayer is pooh-poohing reports of this from veterinarians and haven't thoroughly tested their product. A few mentioned that some of the ingredients in the product had been shown to have adverse affects when used in other similar products that had been taken off the shelves.

Had I been a bit more with it, I might have reasoned that itching/rolling has been reported with a multitude of topical flea and tick prevention. I also might have noted that my application might not have been the best, and Tess may have gotten the application site with her tongue, hence the spit-up. BUT I had spent the last twoish hours having everything I ever learned in biochem in undergrad crammed back into my head and was not really reasonable at that point (can you blame me?), so I panicked a bit and gave my dog a bath. Twice.

Incidentally, I bought this today:

And THIS is what I did with it:

OM NOM NOM.

My soup pot is getting a workout.

Since fall is here, I decided that I was going to take my aforementioned vegetable swag and make some tasty soups.

First up was my vegetable cassoulet. The making was pretty uneventful, so here are some pretty pictures for you guys to look at.

Tastes fantastic, but I will warn you that you will most likely have some pretty gnarly gas a few hours after consuming. TOTALLY WORTH IT.

Add in some decent bread, a beer, and some Badger football, and you've got it made.

Tonight I was going to go to Zumba but decided to make butternut squash soup instead. It made sense at the time.

Things I've learned throughout the course of the night:

1. In a fight between a peeler and a butternut squash skin (rind?), the squash will piledrive the shit out of the peeler.
2. One should really not try to make soup that involves pureeing when one does not own a) a blender, b) an immersion blender, or c) a normal sized food processor. While it is possible to make soup in a two-cup mini-processor, I would not recommend it.
3. Mushing up cooked squash with your hands is supremely satisfying.

I found this recipe on Food and Wine. I really need to stop spending my free time on there because of two reasons. First, I spend way too much time pinning recipes (Pinterest is the new Facebook), and second, I get excited about these really involved recipes and spend way too much on ridiculous ingredients. I am a budding foodie on a budget. Le sigh.

Anywho, this piqued my interest because of the number of spices used and the fact that it involved goat cheese. Love goat cheese.

There was also an ingredient listed called "harissa" which is an African chile paste. Supposedly it's pretty easy to make yourself, but I lacked the motivation to find the correct types of chiles and then mush them up. I think you can also find it in the imported food aisle, but inertia had set in and I didn't want to go to the store. I used this instead; I may make a new label that says "Layman's Harissa."
 

So after cooking the squash with the onion and tomato paste and putting the first batch through the little food processor that could, I found huge chunks of squash still sitting in my puree. Which I could not get rid of no matter how long I held down the "fast" button. Smug bastards.

I got annoyed with trying to chase down and squish the chunks with the back of my spoon, so I got proactive and mushed up the cooked squash in the pot BEFORE I put it in the food processor. If you ever get the opportunity to be elbow deep in a squash pot squishing squash, do it. It's therapeutic. Also hot. Wait for the squash to cool sufficiently so that you don't burn the ever-lovin' bejeezus out of your fingers.

No pictures of that; the iPhone is not butternut squash-proof.

 Add the cream and goat cheese...

 And stir it in...

 Soup!

Was that part of the Elder Swear?

$21.50

That's how much I made playing at the farmer's market this morning.

For those of you who haven't read the last few posts, I decided to apply to be a performer at the Saturday farmer's market here in Urbana. This was my first weekend playing, and I can say with confidence that the experience was cold.

It is October, after all.

In all seriousness, it was really fun. I probably spent more time talking to people about the harp than I actually did playing (which would explain my poor-ish take). Not many people have seen a harp up close before, and most people think of a concert pedal when they think of harp, so I got a LOT of questions. I also ran into a biology grad student who is also a harp player, and exchanged phone numbers. The local retirement community may be getting some harp duets in the future.

After packing up and stowing my harp and paraphernalia in my car, I promptly spent my mass of one dollar bills on produce. And cheese.

MORE VEGETABLE SWAG.

The purple thingy is a Japanese eggplant; I bought one out of curiosity. Butternut squash soup and vegetable cassoulet... NOM. Love fall.

I also went apple picking a week or so ago. I stuffed the 1/2 peck bag they gave me as full as I could without splitting it, and scurried home with my goodies. The next day, I made pie.

I got out my sacred pastry text (a.k.a. the America's Test Kitchen Baking book) and looked up the apple pie recipe therein. Apparently, the trick to keeping your apples from shrinking away from the top of the pie is to pre-cook them.

The honorable grapefruit bird presides.

Why does my crust never look as good as the picture? And they make it look so EASY.

Viola! Pie!

I still have a ton of apples left, so I'm going to try making an apple braid. We'll see how this turns out; yeast and I have a Sharks-Jets kind of relationship, and I don't mean the Tony and Maria sort.

Stop judging me, squirrel.

I went to the grocery store after I finished with my rotation today. Here's what I bought:

My salt squirrel is totally giving me the eye.

Beer, butter, and baking stuff. Food priorities. Oi.

In other news, I'm trying to make progress on my "do something neat" goal. To paraphrase NPH as Barney, I'm going to stop being lame and start being awesome (true story). I've started a book list which has quickly morphed into a list of classic literature that I haven't read. Books on the list include The Sound and the Fury and Of Mice and Men; since I now have a library card, I want to make it through the list by the end of the school year. I figure it'll give me something totally different to focus on than SCIENCE! and furry things.

Nerdily slightly-awesome?

I also signed up to busk at the local farmer's market. I did this a few weekends in the Old Market when I lived in Omaha, but it's been a while. It should be pretty fun and hopefully will earn me a few dollars in the process.

DFTBA, kids.

Solo Sunday.

It rained here. All day. That meant any motivation to do stuff went in the toilet today.

I shouldn't say that I didn't get anything done today. I unloaded my dishwasher, watered my plants, and took my dog for a very brief walk. Other than that, I made a brief foray to the Urbana Free Library (why it isn't the "public" library, I have no idea) and got myself a card. And some books and a pumpkin spice latte.

Guess which one I decided to read first? The Steinbeck novel? The dorky Doctor Who book?

Nope; I chose the mind bubblegum that it a Mercedes Lackey novel.

I stuck around the library for a few hours to read and sip my latte. Apparently Sundays are live music days, since there was a jazz quintet (with a banjo!) that was playing in an area right off of the entrance. It was a pretty good way to waste some time this afternoon, and a great way to wile away a few hours on a rainy Sunday.

Alas, the library closes around 5 on Sundays, so I left about four. So what was I to do with the rest of my Sunday afternoon/evening?

Well, I DID go to the farmer's market yesterday, and I DID get all of this great produce swag...

Is swag the right term for vegetables? I like the word, so whatever.

The tomatoes looked particularly good, so I found a recipe to use some of them. I'm too lazy to write it out here, so you can go to the original website to read it.

I now present the making of a tart in photos (if you want the full experience, listen to Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog; that was my soundtrack):

I didn't have a tart pan, so I just used my springform pan. I might lose some points on presentation, but I don't think it'll effect the taste much. I also had never used Gruyere cheese before, but I've decided that I love it. It has bit of a pungent smell that I think is awesome with the smell of fresh-picked basil. If I could only smell one thing for the rest of my life, that might be it.

On second thought, maybe not. I would get really sick of it, and then where would the specialness be?

Anyway, here's the finished product:

Pretty damn tasty, if you ask me. Unfortunately, it's only little ol' me here to enjoy it. I used to have people over for dinner at my apartment in Ames, and I find that I really miss that. I like cooking (or attempting to cook) for people and eating a meal with friends. *Le sigh*

So. Anyone want to come to dinner anytime soon?